


Equilibrium

by RayShippouUchiha



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Angst, Awkward Rey, Drama, Droid cuteness, Evolving Tags, F/M, Force-use, Jedi, M/M, Obsessive Behavior, Other, Rating subject to change, Sith, Still MAJOR Spoilers, The Force is alive, The Force wants Balance, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2016-01-11
Packaged: 2018-05-07 23:00:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5473715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RayShippouUchiha/pseuds/RayShippouUchiha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Above all else the Force sough unity.</p><p>Above all else the Force sought Balance.</p><p>And yet True Balance could not be achieved alone, could not be willed into existence.  True Balance required action and actors.</p><p>And so the Force reached out Its hand and once again put things into motion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Saw Episode VII and couldn't help myself. May or may not continue this depending on how I feel and the responses I get.
> 
> Also I refer to the Force as It

_"The ways of the Living Force are beyond our understanding… But fear not. You are in the hands of something much greater and much better than you can imagine."_

_―Qui-Gon Jinn_

~~

The Force writhed and It lay calmly, It hated and It loved, It was _everything_ and It was _nothing_.

It twisted and wove itself around everything, a tapestry of sheer energy and will.

Glorious.  Alive.

 _Purposeful_. 

Above all It sought unity.

Above all It sought _Balance_.

But Balance could not be achieved on Its own, could not be simply _willed_ into being as so many other things could be.  True Balance required action, required more than It could will on Its own.

Steps had to be taken.

It had tried once before.  It had crafted the perfect conduit, had called it into being within a suitable host and littered its very soul with _power_.  In the harsh deserts It had nurtured Its Chosen’s soul, had nourished the creature’s body despite its meager living conditions, had kept it _alive_ and _strong_.

And then It had brought a Knight to the Chosen’s side and set Its plans into motion.

It had watched and It had waited as Its Chosen grew and gained strength and knowledge, as it worked ever closer to the goal that had been set before it.  It saw Its’ plans come to fruition, watched Its Chosen restore Balance.

And yet the Balance that had been achieved by Its Chosen was not a lasting one It realized too late.

Its Chosen had triumphed only to fall into the Darkness, a creature of seething hatred and pain instead of the being of Unity the Chosen was supposed to be.

And so the Chosen’s own offspring had been called to rise up and strike it down.

The Force had twisted in something like sorrow, like anger and pain on a level that transcended true emotion as It realized Its mistake.

Existence was, at its very core, a game of opposites, of duality, of action and reaction.  Every action had an equal and opposite reaction.  Every being had an equal, a matched and mated mirror, a perfect complement that created Balance.  All of them, that was, except for Its Chosen.  While it had loved and been loved there had been no true Balance, no true Unity, and thus the Chosen had been swayed.  Tainted.

Unbalanced.

That was the flaw.

It had set Its Chosen to the task of restoring Balance and yet It had not provided any of Its own.

A mistake that would not bear repeating.

It’s simple enough to accomplish.

It twists the echoes of Its Chosen into a new form, plants its seed and waits for it to grow even as It crafts its other half into shape from already existing pieces.

The Force will have Unity.

The Force will have Balance.

All It has to do is provide the necessary pieces first.

~~~

She’s quiet when she’s born, a small silent thing in her mother’s frightened arms.  Arms that tremble when they hold her, hands that shake when they touch her.

‘ _No husband, no father.  Disgraceful_.’  The villagers whisper behind their hands as her mother hurries her through the square but she’s too young to understand why that’s a bad thing.  Too young to understand why her mother pales and clutches at her hand with a grip that’s painful.

Instead Rey just looks up at her mother, at the sunken eyes and line bracketed purse of her lips, at the fear she’s too young to recognize that shines out at her every time her mother looks down at her, and _smiles_.

Rey loves her mother and _never_ wants to leave her.

~~~

He’s loud when he’s born, a small wailing thing in his mother’s warm arms.  Arms that curl around him safely when they hold him, hands that caress when they touch him.

His father’s just as proud, just as loving if less strict and more carefree.

There’s such love in his home, such love in his life.

‘ _Young Prince._ ’ Many of the people in his life call him, just as some still call his mother Princess, smiles wide and hands raised in welcome.

Ben loves his parents, loves his Uncle Luke, loves his life, and he _never_ wants to leave.

~~~

The sands of Jakku are hot, the air is dry and the sand bites painfully at her skin as she strains against the hold on her arm and cries for the ship that’s leaving her behind.

For the mother who’d given her a strained smile and told her she’d be back.

Rey stops eventually when she realizes that it makes no difference, that crying won’t change anything.  She stops because she knows that even though she’s sad it won’t be _forever_.  Her mother _loves_ her and she’ll come back to get her.

She _promised_.

All Rey has to do is be strong.

All Rey has to do is be brave.

All Rey has to do is _wait_.

~~~

He does leave though.  He’s still so young but he leaves with his Uncle Luke, goes to the world of oceans and tiny green islands with a handful of others to learn about the writhing, broiling mass of power within his body.

The Force is what Unc- _Master_ calls It.

Ben wants to learn _everything_ about It.

Above all else Ben just wants to learn, wants to grow, wants to help rebuild the Order.

Above all else Ben just wants to be a Jedi like his Master, and like his _Grandfather_.

~~~

Rey waits.

And waits.

Time passes

The puppy fat that had clung to her bones melts away, her skin darkens, her hair grows, and nothing changes except for her.

Her mother doesn’t come back.  There is no word from her, from anyone.

There is only sand and heat and hunger.  Only the cruelty of the other scavengers, their boots in her ribs as they beat her down because she’s still small enough not to put up enough of a fight to stop them when they steal what little she manages to scavenge.

There is only hardness on Jakku and the smallest flame of _hope_.

Rey doesn’t know why she’s been left behind, doesn’t know why her mother left her on Jakku, but she holds onto the hope that one day she’ll return.  That one day Rey will see her again.  That one day there will be food and water and comfort again.

That one day there’ll be softness instead of grit and steel and sand.

All the while she ignores the first whispers of _doubt_ , ignores the small voice that tells her she’s been _abandoned_.

Yet with each tally mark she etches into the wall of the small hovel she’d managed to set up that whisper only _grows_ and she’s helpless to stop it.

~~~

“What I, what _we_ , would ask of you …” Master Skywalker’s voice trails off, the hoarse rasp of it heavy and sorrowful in a way that makes Ben’s heart _clench_.

“I can do it.”  Ben struggles to make his voice even, to make it strong and solid, powerful like the thrum of the Force that runs so vibrantly through his very veins.  “I’m strong enough.”

“Yes, you are.”  Master _Uncle that traitorously soft part of Ben’s heart murmurs before he shuts it down and forces it away_ nods as he turns to face him.  Master’s expression is placid, calm with the inner peace that Jedi live by but Ben has never been able to completely grasp.  _He’s always been a creature of too much emotion, explosive in his highs and lows, a bright swath of flame in both anger and joy._

Still Ben thinks, if even only for a moment, that he can see a terrible, aching kind of sadness in his Master’s eyes, a yawning chasm of regret and agony.

“The Dark is seductive, powerful, and above all else cunning.”  Master warns/reminds him.  “You must walk a careful balance if this is to succeed.  You must succumb and yet retain yourself.  You must walk the path of shadows and yet you must not waver from your goal.”

“I know.”  Ben stays where he is, kneeling in the center of the meditation room.  “Balance must be restored Master and if this is the sacrifice that must be made then I am willing to pay it.”

“I know.”  Master murmurs again but this time Ben isn’t sure if he’s meant to actually hear.  “And I am not sure if I’ll ever be able to forgive myself for allowing you to do so.”

~~~

Rey dreams of _water_ , of oceans and tiny green islands.

She dreams of a cool salty breeze on her face, of grass beneath her feet.

~~~

Months later Ben watches with carefully passive eyes as the temple he’d spent so much of his time in was consumed by flame before he turns and walks back towards the waiting shuttle.  His hands clench at his side as he walks to meet his destiny.

He is set firmly on his Path now.

He will become what he must in order to do what has been asked of him.

There is no going back.

~~~

Rey is a creature of steel now, of sand and flame so hot it’s turned cold.  She’s been beaten into the form she has now, whittled down by sun and sand and cruelty, carved down by fists and feet, shaped from too little food and too much work.

The hope that she’s held close to her heart since she was a child still lingers in her chest, a small flickering flame that she nurses with everything she has even as she knows it for the lie that it is.

No one is coming for her.

No one ever was.

She just can’t bear to admit the truth out loud.

That lie is all that she has left anymore, that and her dreams and her own fierce burning will to _survive_.

It’s enough, will have to be, because it’s all that she has, is all that she’s had for so very long now.

~~~

Be-Kylo _he is Kylo Ren now, a Knight of Ren no matter how the title still chafes_ excels underneath the tutelage of Snoke.  The training is _painful_ , nothing like Unc-Mast-Luke Skywalker’s had been but he does not complain.

Instead Kylo presses forward, learns to embrace the pain, learns to use it instead of letting it use him.  His temper flares out of control more often now that he’s stopped trying to reach that state of non-emotion Jedi all aspire for.

Snoke encourages his rages, pushes him to embrace the whirling fire of his hatred, whispers to him that Sith exist inside that column of fiery hatred, that the heat will make him flourish.

Kylo buries everything that remains of what he once was beneath that fire and reaches out for the Dark with both hands.

He knows what he has to do.

~~~

Rey still dreams of blue and green but more and more often she dreams of hands that do not hurt when they touch her, of arms that are warm and safe and loving when they hold her. She dreams of the scent of leather and fire, of a warmth that scorches her but does not _burn_.

She wakes sobbing, eyes dry but body aching for the ghost of the embrace that haunts her dreams.

Sometimes she wonders if what she’s dreaming about is a longing or a _memory_.

She isn’t sure which.

But she does know that the hands that hold her, the hands that touch her so _sweetly_ , are as _strong_ and solid and calloused as her own against her skin.  She knows that in those dreams she feels a sense of _rightness_ and _completeness_ that is so real it makes her wish she could still weep like she had when she was a child.

But her tears are gone now, eaten by this desert, by this life, by the heat and sand that is her world.

~~~

Kylo dreams of heat, of sand and wind, of gnawing, never ending hunger.

But, more often than not, he dreams of _her_.  He doesn’t see her face, doesn’t really _see_ her at all, but he knows that the body in his arms is female, that the skin he traces with his fingertips at night belongs to a woman who holds _ice_ at her very core.

Her coolness is a balm to the ever burning fire that makes up his center, the raging inferno that is his heart of hearts, the flame within him that grows ever brighter the further he sinks into the Sith training he endures.

He loathes waking most mornings, is always volatile and easy to provoke before he manages to lock thoughts of his dreams away.  He berates himself, calls himself foolish and rages at the idea of falling victim to the call of something as simple as a dream.

Still he _longs_ for her even if he knows she isn’t real.  Craves this woman with ice at her center and steel in her scent even if he knows it’s just a dream.  He longs for her so desperately that he feels tears well in his eyes unbidden, feels sorrow writhe in his chest like a thing with claws.

He knows that he should give the dreams up, knows he should block them from his mind, that his duty, his rise to power, is far more important.

And yet he finds that he can’t bring himself to do so.

He’s already given up so much _will give up so much more in the future_ that he wants to be selfish in this one thing.

So he holds the dreams close in one hand as his other reaches ever further into the Dark, the tainted red glow of his saber a bright, wicked light at his side.

~~~

Rey stops and stares up at the sky, at the brilliant net of stars that shine down on her.  The air feels different, like there’s something in it tugging at her hair and her clothes, trying to urge her forward.

Likes something’s calling her.

For some reason she can’t help but feel as if everything is about to change.

She both fears and welcomes the thought.

~~~

Kylo can feel Captain Phasma’s eyes on him as she asks for instruction.  Can feel her gaze through her helmet and the expectations it holds.

“Kill them.”  He turns his back on the innocents he’s condemned to death and does his best to ignore the way the waste and the cruelty kills some fragile part of him that he tries so desperately to hide.

A Stormtrooper catches his eye in the distance but he waves it away and heads back to his ship.

He can’t focus on that now.  Not with the way things are changing.

He needs to focus now more than ever.  Far too many things are up in the air for him to lose sight of his goals now.

He’s sacrificed so much already.  He can’t afford to destroy it all now because he was distracted.

He has a prisoner to interrogate and a map to find.

~~~

The droid is small and almost cute Rey can’t help but think.  It also has a mission and even as the hunger churns in her gut she can’t bring herself to trade it for the ration packets she’s been offered.

Even if it is more food than she’s seen in all the years she’s been on Jakku, even if it would keep her alive and fed for cycles upon end if she rationed it out properly.

But some part of her, some small still voice inside her mind whispers to her that the droid, that little BB-8, is important.

It’s the same voice that tells her where to step on decaying ledges, that tells her when she’s not alone, when there’s danger and what parts to salvage from the wrecks around her.  It’s the same voice that lets her hands glide over bits and pieces of broken machinery and make it work again.  The same one that makes her stare at that garbage heap of a ship outside the trading post with the knowledge that she could pilot it beating in her chest.

That voice, that pull, that knowledge, has never been wrong before so Rey listens to it even if a part of her doesn’t want to.

~~~

Kylo gets his information from Poe.  Knows where the droid with the map is hidden and now all he has to do is find it.

Only something happens that he’d never even considered possible.

A Stormtrooper betrays the First Order and absconds with Poe, back down to Jakku, back down where the droid is.

Kylo feels rage flare to life deep inside of him as he rips the room apart in a maelstrom of Force backed anger.

But there is a whisper deep beneath his skin that says that things are _changing_.

~~~

Rey finds that her patience with the boy, _because it’s hard to think of him as a man with that sweet light and softness in his face_ , fluxes rapidly.

She doesn’t like the way he grabs her hand like he has the right, doesn’t like the way his hand feels almost familiar but not quite _right_.  Even with her awe at the thought of him being part of the Resistance she doesn’t like it.

But she’s too busy running to focus on it too much.

Too busy trying not to die as they run with BB-8 on their heels.

She’ll think about it later.

~~~

The droid escapes on the _Millennium Falcon_ of all vessels and Kylo feels something _clench_ within him at the thoughts that plague his mind.

He pushes them away though.  He doesn’t have time for any of it.  Snoke is impatient for the droid and Kylo has a job to do, worth to continue proving as always.

He has to finish what _he_ started.  Has to finish it once and for all no matter how doubt plagues him, no matter how much it hurts.  No matter how many times he has to beg the spirit of his Grandfather for aid he knows what he has to do.

Even if the call of the Light pulls at him Kylo knows he must not give in.

His place is in the Dark now after all.

~~~

 _Han Solo_.  Rey can barely believe who it is she’s managed to run into.  Can barely believe the vessel she’s on, can barely believe what she’s managed to get herself wrapped up in.

There’s something _familiar_ about the man, something that goes beyond the stories she’d heard about him.  Being close to him makes her feel more peaceful than she’s felt in _years_ even with his dubious methods and sarcastic personality.

She _likes_ him, likes the gruff almost fumbling way he handles her, and the idea is almost more than she can grasp.  She hasn’t truly liked anything in so very long she was almost sure she wasn’t capable of being soft like that anymore.  Even if Finn is beginning to grow on her the closer they get to where ever it is that Solo is taking them.

Then they land and it’s on a planet that’s _green_ , so very green that she has a hard time believing it exists.  Solo offers her a job in his stumbling way and she thinks that maybe, despite the way he puts it off as _Chewbacca_ liking her, that maybe he feels that same comforting familiarity from her that she does from him.

Still she can’t bring herself to commit to it, forces herself to remember her promise to stay on Jakku even if that hope is a guttered flame that no longer burns within her.

She follows him into the temple turned cantina though because if all else fails she still wants to help BB-8, wants to help the Resistance.

But then Finn tries to leave, tries to abandon the responsibility of BB-8 and his quest and Rey realizes that she’s grown far fonder of him than she’d thought.

It _hurts_ her to watch him go, to watch Finn turn his back on her but she’s used to pain, used to being left behind.  Used to sadness.

Voices call her in the distance, lure her down steps and through tunnels until she stands before a dusty, abandoned trunk.

There’s a lightsaber inside of it and screams inside her mind.  Visions of pain and death, of betrayal and a yawning sort of Darkness.

She runs.

And even when it’s offered to her Rey can’t take the saber, can’t bear to touch the thing even though it calls for her, longs for her, wants to belong to her.  For once she actually misses Jakku, misses the heat and the hunger because at least they were familiar.  Far more familiar than the phantom anguish in her heart from memories and tragedies that were never her own.

She leaves.  BB-8 follows her into the forest.

Her mind is a whirlwind of confusion but still that voice whispers that change is coming.

~~~

Kylo tracks the droid into the forest relentlessly, saber in hand and death waiting to be dealt to any who stand in the way of his goals.

Only … _she_ is there, some strange woman in white who stares at him defiant but still fearful.

 _Beautiful_ is his first thought when he sees her, face hard with fear as she fires relentlessly at him and scrambles to escape.

It is no matter though because he will not be stopped, will not be interfered with.

It takes longer than he’d thought but not really all that long in the scheme of things for him to best her.

But when he hoists her up into his arms he finds that he cannot deny the way she feels in his grasp.  The way her body seems to sprawl trustingly against him even in her unconscious state, muscles lax and limbs fluid as if in the deepest state of relaxation.

A part of him wishes he could bury his face in the vulnerable curve of her neck, wishes his mask and gloves were gone so he could take in her scent, so that he could taste and touch and feel her skin.

Instead he carries her away and ignores the hum of satisfaction and the bright leaping flame of joy he feels at having her at his side.

~~~

Rey wakes to the sight of the masked warrior who’d found her in the woods sitting almost serenely across from her.

His voice is silky even through the mask but she forces herself to harden against the sound, to become steel and stone against the almost gentle coaxing of his tone.

She snarls at him, hardens her resolve to say nothing.  To betray nothing and no one.

But then he takes off his helmet and she sees him for the first time.

He’s young, handsome in an almost boyish way, eyes dark and sorrowful.  She has the urge to reach out to him, to touch the high arch of his cheek, the fullness of his mouth.

She looks him in the eye and something deep within her _thrums_.  Her heart hammers in her chest and even if she doesn’t want to admit it only part of it is out of fear.

 _‘I know you.’_   Some part of her whispers and for a moment she wants to tell him everything, wants to spill her secrets out to him like blood from a wound, wants to unfurl for him like a flower for the sun.

 But then he is inside her _mind_ and it’s _wrong_.  She can feel him, can feel his solid, hot presence inside of her but it’s not right, it’s too rough, too cruel.  He rips her open, floods the holes in her defenses with Darkness that doesn’t feel as she somehow knows it should.

“You feel so alone.”  He sounds almost seductive, almost pleading, and in his words she hears the echo of his own thoughts _‘I feel so alone’_ as if he’d spoke them aloud.  And beneath them she hears the offer he’s yet to speak aloud.

 _‘Together.’_   His soul seemed to whisper to her, plaintive and coaxing.  ‘ _We can be together.  No more loneliness.  Just Unity, just Balance.’_

For a too long moment she’s tempted but something roars to life inside of her then.  Something that refuses to be cowed, something that tells her now is not the time, that this is not how things are supposed to go.  She pushes back, forces herself inside of him, burrows deep beneath his shields and speaks his fear back at him.

“You’re afraid that you’ll never be as strong as Darth Vader.”  And in the shock in his eyes, in the pain in his expression, she takes a vicious but still shallow sort of satisfaction.

She’s hurt him and as much as she thinks he might deserve it deep down she doesn’t like the idea of causing him pain.

And when he whirls around and leaves a part of her cries out for him to stay.

~~~

Kylo _wants_ her.

He wants her more than he’s wanted anything in his life, more than anything he’s ever dreamed of in his existence.

He wants to keep her, wants to train and mold her.  He wants her by his side, at his back, want her beneath him, around him.  He wants to gorge himself on her presence, wants to sink his consciousness into her own until they’re melded together.

He just wants her.

She has so much potential.  The Force is so strong within her, stronger than anyone else he’s ever met.  She could aid him in his quest, could be by his side and help him to move forward.  Together the very _worlds_ would tremble before them.

With her at his side perhaps there would even be hope for him in the future.

So he goes to Snoke, goes to plead his case that she is far more useful than the droid because _useful_ will keep her alive, will keep her within reach.

And when he returns to find her gone the rage he feels is beyond anything he’s ever experienced, beyond anything he knew he was capable of.  He is fire, he is wrath, he is a volcano of fury, a supernova of unadulterated rage.

The lose he feels at her absence he buries beneath the red haze of his ire.

~~~

Rey can feel the Force within her like a living thing now, can feel it in her heartbeat, in her lungs, in the thrumming in the back of her mind that urges her forward.

Finding out that Finn had come to save her, that Han and Chewbacca are at his side, is a welcome and unexpected shock.

She ignores the part of her that wants to turn, wants to go back to that room, wants to find _him_ and drag him along behind her because she can’t stay but she doesn’t want to leave him either.

Instead she focuses on what Han and Finn are saying, focuses on the plot to destroy this monstrous weapon the First Order has created.

Too many lives have already been lost to it.  Rey cannot just stand by and allow more to be destroyed.

~~~

 _‘Father.’_   A small, childish part of Kylo can’t help but sob as he stares at the weathered, sorrowful face of Han Solo.  His father who’s trying desperately to take him home, back to mother and softness, back to warm arms and gentleness, back to the Light.

Kylo _wants_ to go.  He wants to go so so badly, almost as much as he wants _her_.

And yet …

“I know what I have to do.”  Kylo tells his father.  “But I don’t know if I have the strength.”

He doesn’t want to do this.  He doesn’t want to do any of this.  Not this.  Never this.  Even though he knows it’s necessary.  Even though he knows, has always known, that this moment would eventually come.

Because know he knows what Skywalker had meant when he’d spoken of forgiveness.

“Will you help me do this?”  Kylo asks as he holds his saber out in front of him like an offer and looks into his father’s eyes.  As their eyes meet he pushes himself across the way, pushes himself into his father’s mind.  He sees the moment understanding hits him, sees the moment Han Solo realizes what needs to happen, what has to happen, and accepts it.

“ _Anything_.”  Han tells him and reaches out to wrap his hand around the middle of Kylo’s lightsaber.

The weapon, the symbol of all he has worked for, trembles in their grasps.

And when the light fades and darkness spreads across their forms Kylo and Han turn the blade together and Kylo watches as it burns its way through his father’s chest.

In the distance he hears a scream, there’s a burning pain in his side, and when he looks up all he sees is _her_.

~~~

Rage sweeps through Rey like a cold wind.

Rage and betrayal.

Han is dead, killed by _his_ hands.

Finn is injured, bleeding out on the ground but still alive.

And _he_ stands before her, one hand outstretched imploringly.

She wants to take it, wants to go to him, to tend to the wound on his side, on his soul.  But the betrayal, the rage, the protectiveness she feels towards Finn’s downed form all stop her.

So instead she fights, the lightsaber she’d rejected before sings in triumph when it finds its place in her hand.

“You need a teacher.”  He practically pleads with her, eyes dark with tears, face lined with anguish that she can practically taste.  “ _Let me teach you_.”

There is a terrible kind of sorrow on his face, a yearning she feels reflected deep inside of her.  She wants him, wants to take his offer and draw him closer to her.  Except she _can’t_.  She can’t condone what he’s done, what he’s helped the First Order to do.

The senseless violence, the murder of _billions_.

Such devastation.

Such _evil_.

She _wants_.  But like with so many other things in her life she can’t _have_.

Then the earth between them splits open, seperates them as if by some divine move.  All she can do is run to Finn and try to get him out of danger.  She almost sobs in relief at the sight of Chewbacca when he shows up.

But standing on the ramp of the Millennium Falcon she can’t help but look back the way she’d come for a split second and pray that he’d also managed to find a way to safety.

It might be wrong, she knew, to hope for his life, but for some reason she could do nothing else.

~~~

Kylo watches her go.

His face aches just like his side and his heart and his _soul_.

He watches her disappear into the trees before he gets up, turns on his heel, and stumbles towards the ship he can feel in the distance.

He feels it when she leaves, when the Falcon hits light speed and disappears, feels it like there’s a chord stretched from him to her that’s been pulled taunt by the distance but refuses to break.

He’ll see her again he knows.

No matter what the future brings he’ll see her.

He knows with a certainty he cannot explain that they will never escape each other.  That he’ll never escape her.

_Mine, a part of him whispers. Mine, mine, mine._

What’s more is the fact that he doesn’t want to.

In fact all he wants it to entwine himself around her, wants to imbed himself so deep inside of her that they’ll _never_ be apart from each other no matter how much distance comes between them.

One day, he swears to himself silently, he _will_.

~~~

The Force writhed and It lay calmly, It hated and It loved, It was _everything_ and It was _nothing_.

It twisted and wove itself around everything, a tapestry of sheer energy and will.

Glorious.  Alive.

 _Purposeful_. 

Above all It sought unity.

Above all It sought _Balance_.

Now It had provided the means.  Now It had crafted two vessels for Its’ will.  Now that it had potential conduits for true Light and true Dark that were each gloriously complimentary to the other, It would have what It craved.

Through their unity It would finally have Balance.

It was just a matter of time.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well the response you guys gave me was amazing so thank you all for that!

_"Well, the Force is what gives a Jedi his power. It's an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us and penetrates us; it binds the galaxy together."_

_―Obi-Wan Kenobi_

~~~

The Force _watched_.

It watched _everything_.

That was Its nature, Its way.

Its pieces were in place.  Balance was on the horizon.

All that was required was time.

And the Force was, above all else, _patient_.

~~~

Life, Rey had found out when she was young, _when the sand and the heat of Jakku still burned, before ice had become her center, her anchor_ , always moves on.

It seems impossible in some ways to think that it can.  It almost seems ridiculous to think that the universe can keep spinning ever onwards after the deaths of so many _after Han, after the billions of innocents on the planets that simply weren’t there anymore_.  She feels as if something should have changed, as if somehow existence should transform to reflect the gaping hole that has been left behind from so much _senseless_ death.

It feels like somehow life should reflect the ever echoing screams of fear and pain and _unbalance_ she can hear _screeching_ across the Force.

But, for the most part, it doesn’t.

People still struggle onwards.

Are they angrier?  _Yes_.

Are they frightened?  Of course they are.  More than most wish to admit.

But beyond that the changes she sees are _subtle_ , easy for most people to dismiss, easy for most people to overlook.

Rey has never been like most people.  Or at least she doesn’t think she is, not when she can see herself so clearly juxtaposed against the rest of the Resistance.  They are all so _alive_ even in their grief, so _bright_ and _vibrant_ in a way that she just … _isn’t_.

It makes her sad sometimes when she stops to think about it but she brushes the emotion off as she’d learned to do years ago.  Jakku had turned her cold inside where they were warm, had turned her quiet and calm from years of solitude and hunger, from years of unending heat and loneliness and there was nothing she can do to change that.

Most of all it had made her observant, had made her eyes sharp and her reflexes sharper so she tends to see more and to see it clearly.

_Jakku is a desert at its heart and deserts eat the weak and unobservant, chews them up and swallows down the bones until there isn’t anything left for even the scavengers to find.  Rey has always been determined not to go out that way.  She won’t give Jakku the satisfaction of stripping the flesh from her bones until every drop of fight and determination has finally been drained out of her.  And her wells have always been so very deep._

The thing she notices most though is the fact that there is a sadness to General Organa that wasn’t there before.  Even in the brief moments they’d been around each other before everything on that planet had happened Rey had seen the vibrancy in her, the life and the color beneath the stress and the burdens she carried.

The deep, aching well of grey sadness is new.  Rey sees it the instant she touches back down with Chewbacca at her heels, Finn in his arms, and Han lost to the void.

She sees it in the way the older woman’s clothes are a mourning black already, as if Han’s loss has sucked the very color from her world.  Rey can see it in the fine lines around her mouth, the perfectly straight balance of her spine and shoulders.  The General looks _strong_ still, Rey isn’t sure if the woman knows how to be anything but, and yet she also looks _brittle_ to Rey.

The General is frayed and cracked just so around the corners, like a pillar just starting to crumble beneath the burden it has been assigned without its permission.

_A phantom hovers just behind the General, shaggy haired and frowning, hands ghosting ethereal but lovingly over the tight coil of her hair._

Rey can hardly bear to look at her sometimes and sometimes she can barely stand to look away.

 _His_ face flashes through her mind in those moment, eyes dark and wild, face tear stained and expression just a shade off broken even before she’d burned him.  She always shakes her head and chases thoughts of him away with a heavy heart.

The guilt she feels from thinking of him is an old but familiar friend _because she had to have done something wrong to deserve being sentenced to Jakku and even if she isn’t sure what it was she’s always repented for it anyways_ and the loss of Han has just brought it home to roost once more.  Logically she knows that she’d been too far away to do anything to help.  But that knowledge doesn’t make things any better

Thinking about _him_ only makes it worse so she tries not to.

But she can’t stop the _dreams_.

And, despite the way it eats at her sometimes, she has to admit to herself that she doesn’t really want to.

Because the hands that touch her in her sleep, the arms that have held her for so long as she rested, the quiet sort of strength and the bright blaze of heat that has accompanied her at night for years, now has a _face_ and a _name_.

Kylo Ren, Ben Solo, Sith, traitor, villain, murder _broken, sad boy, something whispers to her, twisted pitiful boy, Dark but not evil, shadowed but not without his own glow._

So despite it all, despite the betrayal and the pain she feels over what he’s done, she can’t stop the dreams.  Because even with the Force thrumming bright and strong in her veins, even with the ability to shield her mind laying at her fingertips, she doesn’t want to.

Because those dreams are _hers_ and she guards them jealously.  For so long they were all she had, were the only comfort, the only kindness she could _almost_ touch.

For so long they had been the only kind of heat to truly phase her.

Rey knows, in that way she’s always brutally honest with herself, that she’ll miss them if they’re gone.

And that, feels like a kind of betrayal all on its own.

~~~

There is _pain_.

So very much of it, more even than the agony he’d learned to embrace over the years.

Kylo grabs it with both hands and cradles it to his breast, nurtures it with the raging fires of his soul.  It is the least that he deserves he knows, for the things that he has done, for the things that he has allowed to happen, and for the things that he has still _yet_ to do.

Never before has the burden he carries been so heavy, never before has his task seemed so daunting.

His father _all_ _rough worn hands and loving smiles, fingers carding through his curls as he shows him how to pilot, how to fly, how to soar, how to do what is and always has been Han’s first true love and the one thing he wants to share with Ben_ is dead.  Murdered by his own hands and now Kylo is covered in blood that refuses to be washed away no matter how long he spends scrubbing at it.

Even after it’s gone in reality, even after his skin is clean and tender from his scouring, it’s still there, waiting just beneath his skin to well back up again.

Kylo stares into the mirror, reaches up to trace a fingertip across the scar on his face.  It’s healed now but still apparent, still striking in the way it mars his face.  He hadn’t allowed them to heal it all the way, hadn’t been able to bear the thought of having it erased as if it meant _nothing_.

He deserved it for one, a small bit of punishment he could carry with him always.

Plus _she_ had given it to him and he could not bear to part with a token from _her_ even if it was a scar.

The thought of her, of Rey, is what keeps him anchored in the moment, settled in reality.  He latches onto his want for her like the life-line that it is.  He’s teetering dangerously on the knife edge of obsession but Kylo knows that he’s going to fall, _that he’s already fallen_ , that maybe, in fact, he’d never had a choice at all.

He dreams of her still.  He dreams of heat and gnawing hunger of a different kind alongside the memories of sand and wind.  Now he knows that the body his hands trace belongs to her.  Now he sees her _face_ in his dreams, hears her _voice_ , smells the steel scent of her, and want _rages_ through him even brighter than before.

Snoke has always taught him to nurture his flames, to feed the fire of his soul with hatred and passion and in that Kylo has always succeeded.  It was easy to burn brightly when he’s always flamed higher and hotter than those around him.

The dreams are _his_ , are his anchor, his bright bit of soothing coolness in the fiery dark that is his life.

It is no surprise to him that Rey _, sweet, deliciously powerful Rey,_ invokes his passions so richly, so harshly.  It is no surprise to him that he would tip so easily, so readily, over into the bright burning abyss of obsession where she is concerned.

His desire for her is all-encompassing and yet Kylo cannot bring himself to care.

His want for her is an inferno in which he gladly burns.

So he pulls that flame closer to him with blood stained hands and hurtles himself ever further into the Dark with too many regrets to name and yet non that truly seem to matter anymore.

This is his Path.

Woe to those who would see him falter.

~~~

Rey settles into the Resistance base slowly, hesitantly.  She’s assigned a room of her own, and it’s even larger than the hollowed out AT-AT she’d lived in for years.  The space feels strange, like a yawning chasm after so many years spend relatively snug in her little home.

She spends the first two days sitting on the floor of her room because the bed is too soft, a thick blanket wrapped around her shoulders and eyes staring unseeing at the walls around her.  She feels cold now in a way she hasn’t since her early childhood, since before Jakku.  Cold in a physical way instead of an emotional way.  For some reason it shocks her more than anything, slows her down and makes her feel strange.

There is a flurry of activity in the base around her and yet she feels separate from it all, feels lost, unmoored and adrift in a way she’s never felt before.  

Still she isn’t used to being idle, just as she isn’t used to the cool winds of this strangely green planet that makes her long for the first time for thicker clothes, for heat, for _warmth_.

It’s hunger that finally draws her from her stupor.  Hunger, like guilt and sadness, is an old and _hateful_ friend.  She knows hunger intimately by now and while she knows she can go a long time without food she’s loath to push herself to the brink for no reason.

Instead she pulls herself up off of the floor, cleans herself up as best she can, and heads out to do what she does best.  _Work_.  Life’s always been simple for her in many ways, ruled by a handful of truths and on Jakku there was only one way to get food and that was through work.

There’s no one to give her directions but Rey’s been alone for a long time and she isn’t sure she knows how to take them anymore anyways.  Instead she sets out into the camp in the early morning light in search of work that needs doing on her own.  Scavenger to the core and unable to help herself she quietly nicks a few tools that’ve been left laying carelessly around and stows them carefully in her hip pouch.  Her own painstakingly collected set was left behind on Jakku and she’ll need new ones if she’s going to actually get anything done.

Hunger nips at her again and Rey knows that as soon she compiles a large enough list of things she’s done she’ll head to the mess and try to barter for a meal.

Hopefully the Resistance is more generous with their rations than the Overseer on Jakku had been.

In the end it doesn’t take her long to find something to do.  There is an abundance of droids wandering around the Resistance camp.  She crouches down in front of a few that she can see are obviously damaged, talks to them softly as she asks their permission to fix what’s wrong.  They beep and chirp at her eagerly as her hands flitter over their bodies, fingers gently fixing bent antennas, tightening bolts, or even reattaching loose wires.

It doesn’t take her long before she has a small crowd of them gathered around her, all of them talking over each other like over excited children.  It’s enough to make her laugh slightly, a small smile creeping over her face as she carefully realigns a wheel on a scuffed up R2-C4 unit.

One of them answers her questions for more work with a burst of enthusiastic noise that’s quickly echoed by the others.  Bemused she lets them lead her to a large scrap pile off to one side of the camp.  It’s near the forest edge and filled with rusted and destroyed scraps of metal as well as the broken and busted bodies of droids and fighters and so many different kinds of tech that Rey finds herself practically _drooling_ over it.

It’s filled with so many valuable parts, pieces just left to rot that would have kept her fed for _months_ on Jakku.

“No one bothers with any of this?”  Rey asks her small flock of droids.  Their sad clicks and disappointed beeps answer her.

‘Broken.’  They tell her even as a yellow plated maintenance droid runs the edge of one clamp like hand across the husk of what looks like an old model medic-droid.  ‘Abandoned.  Too much trouble to fix.  Easier to ignore.’

“Right.”  Rey mutters sourly as determination steels itself cold and hard within her.  She knows what it’s like to be abandoned, knows what it’s like to be ignored, to be left behind.  Sometimes she wonders if her mother had left her on Jakku because she was _broken_ somehow, because she was just easier to _forget_ about than to _keep_.  “We’ll just see about that.  Give me a hand please.”

Hunger pushed to the back of her mind with familiar ease Rey reaches out, grabs ahold of one end of a thick slab of metal and, with the maintenance droid’s help, heaves it off of the medic-droid and to one side.

The other droids who seem content to settle around her as she works on the medic-droid end up being extremely helpful.  The maintenance droid is happy to lift and turn the heavy medic-droid when she needs it to.  The others are happy to fetch and find her any parts she needs or tools she hasn’t managed to get her hands on yet.

Rey loses herself in fixing the droid in front of her, loses herself in the familiar and easy flow and ebb of mechanical work.  She’s good at it, always has been.  Droids seem to speak to her without words, seem easier for her to understand than most people are.

It is, perhaps, one of the gifts the Force has given her, this inborn knowledge of how they work, of how to understand them and how to fix them.

Six hours, a long but shallow cut to the forearm, and a back that aches slightly from her hunched position later, Rey watches the medic-droid whirl back to life with a sharp burst of satisfaction.  Her small audience of droids go wild and the maintenance droid lurches forward a step before it abruptly stops.

“Welcome back.”  Rey raises a grease covered hand in a gesture of greeting as the medic-droid swivels to look at her.

‘Fixed?’ The medic-droid beeps the question at her almost hesitantly.

“Yeah.”  Rey nodded.  “You’ve been offline for a long while now but you should be okay again for the most part.”

‘You fixed?’  It repeated the question, insistently this time.  ‘Damaged, forced to shut down.  Easier to replace, not efficient.’

“It wasn’t a problem.”  Rey protested with a frown and an awkward shrug.  “I wanted to try and help if I could.  I’m going to get as many of these droids and machines up and running as I can.  I’m good at this kind of thing and it’s the least I can do.’

There’s a long moment of silence from her little crowd before the medic-droid starts talking to the others again.  They all speak too quickly for Rey to catch what they’re saying even with her fluency in droid.

‘Orders Mistress?’  The medic-droid’s question snaps her back to attention and Rey blinks in surprise.

“I’m not your mistress.”  She tells it gently even as she squirms slightly in embarrassment.  “I just fixed you.”

‘Orders Mistress?’  There’s something almost stubborn in the droid’s voice then and Rey realizes with a flash of resigned insight that it’s not a title she’s going to get out of anytime soon.

“There’s a man in the med-bay.”  She tells it after a second’s hesitation.  “His names Finn and he’s hurt pretty bad.  They’ve got him on a bio-bed and he’s healing but …”

‘Orders to observe and facilitate the recovery of _Finn_ acknowledged.’  The medic-droid doesn’t even wait for her to finish.  Rey watches it stride off towards where she knows the med-bay is in bemused silence.

“Well that was … interesting.”  Rey shakes her head and turns back to the pile to scout out her next patient.

The small crowd of droids around her seem even closer than before and they all have an almost smug air about them.

Rey just shrugs it off and gets back to work picking through the pile.

~~~

“A face lingers in your mind my apprentice.”  Snoke’s voice drifts over Kylo like an oily fog, dark and thick and so very oppressive.

“Yes my Master.”  Kylo knows better than to lie to Snoke, knows better than to try and hide anything but the deepest parts of himself from _him_.  He’s strong but Snoke is like a force of nature in his Dark powers, like a black hole with his unparalleled mastery of all that is _Sith_.  He could tear Kylo’s mind open, could leave it a seething mass of pain and suffering if he felt there was something he wanted to know that Kylo wasn’t telling him.

He’d done it before, in the beginning of his training, and Kylo still twitches at night sometimes from the simple _memory_ of the pain that had been visited upon him.

Now he only shields the very heart of himself, the memories of his and Master Skywalker’s plans and that tiny kernel of light in his core that festers inside of him like an infection he cannot heal.

He used to shelter the dreams there as well but no longer.

She has taken over so much of his mind now that he knows it’s useless to hide her from Snoke.  She’s seeped out into his mind, crept out from the box he used to keep the dreams that haunted him locked away in, and there’s nothing he can do to stop her.

“She is rather beautiful.”  Snoke muses with a deliberate sort of nonchalance.  Kylo has to force himself not to stiffen in alarm.  “And as talented as you said.”

“Yes.”  It’s easy to admit because it’s _true_.  She, _Rey_ , is both beautiful and strong.  A calm but bright light in the darkness, a brilliantly glorious star suspended, alone and untouchable, in the darkest parts of space.  “The Force is strong with her, Master.  Her potential is … _staggering_.”

“You wish to have her as your own.”  He can feel Snoke’s eyes boring into the top of his bowed head.

‘No’, Kylo cannot help but think.  He doesn’t want her anymore.  Want is too simple a term for what he feels after having met her, after having held her in his arms in the waking day, after having fought her in the cold and the snow.  Want is too simple a term for what rages inside of him after having seen all that she is and all that she could be.

Now Kylo _yearns_ for her, his longing a flame burning in his chest like he’s swallowed the very star he likens her to.

“It is a desire I see little appeal in and yet not so uncommon nor distasteful I should think.”  He sounds almost affable.  “Those sensitive to the Force are fewer and further between than they once were but still the Force senses itself readily enough.  It is natural for you to be drawn to one with such power as what she possesses.  Plus the Sith will need numbers in the years to come that stretch beyond what we retain now.”

Suddenly Kylo is hit with a sense of realization because he is not foolish enough to miss where Snoke is going with this line of conversation.

“Yes.”  Snoke seems satisfied with his decision.  “Complete your training, become the true Sith I know you can be and she will be yours.  A fitting war prize with which to ensure the next generation.  Your connection to the Force will surely breed true and your whelps will make suitable students in time.  Any who are not will be simple enough to cull.”

Kylo is not even surprised by the flash of sheer possessive _rage_ that roars through him.  Sith or not, Dark or not, he will not allow that to come to pass.

Rey _will_ be his, he’s already decided as much.  One day he will burrow himself deep inside of her mind and body and will open his own to her so that they will never truly separate again.

And should her body ever swell with his child he will tear the Force itself apart to keep them safe.

What is his he will _keep_ , through blood and fire and pain if he must.

Kylo has already given too much for the Path he has chosen and he knows that he will give more.

But _that_ , is something he will _never_ be willing to do.  And Rey, he knows, would never allow him to either if such a future was to come to pass.

He is a _monster_ , Kylo accepts this fact about himself, embraces it with hands still stained with the blood of his father, with the blood of billions of innocents.

But so many forget that monsters are jealous, possessive creatures and they do not part lightly with what they consider to be theirs.

In this he is so very firmly from his grandfather’s line.

~~~

“Rey!”  The shout of her name pulls Rey out of the haze she always falls into when she immerses herself so deeply into a machine.  She blinks and looks up only to see Poe staring at her, hands on his hips and a slightly mystified look on his face.

“What?”  Rey fights the urge to fidget beneath his gaze.  Poe is … kind in a way that makes her vaguely uncomfortable.  He’s all wide beaming smiles and sincerity, not like the gruffness of Han or the fumbling of Finn.  Poe’s so sincerely _nice_ that Rey’s at a bit of a loss as to how to deal with him.

“What are you doing?”  He arches a brow and crouches down across from her, eyes running over the exposed wires of the small astro-droid she was currently attempting to piece back together.

“Fixing it.”  Rey doesn’t bother to go into detail.

“Looks kind of like BB-8.”  Poe muses with unmistakable fondness in his voice.

That’s what had caught Rey’s eye about the tiny droid but she doesn’t say anything, just shrugs and turns back to her work.

“Well that’s all well and good but you should come in and eat.”  Poe stands up and stretches with a slight groan.  “No one’s seen you inside all day so I know you haven’t eaten yet.  You go wash that grease off and meet me in the mess.  I’ve got two seats saved for us at a table.”

Rey does a mental tally of all the work she’s done for the day and decides it should be enough to get her at least a quarter ration for the day.  It’ll have to do.  Plus there’s the fact that she’s gotten by on less in the past.  She’ll just work harder tomorrow if necessary.

“Okay.”  Rey packs her pilfered tools away, scoops the little droid she’s been working on into her arms and turns to head towards her room.  Her small crowd of droids following loyally behind her.  One of them beeps at her curiously and she turns her attention towards it, aware of Poe at her side watching her intently.  “I’m going to take it to my room.  I’ll work on it after I barter and eat.”

Rey makes it to her room quickly enough and when she walks inside and sets the droid on the desk in the corner there’s a small flurry of beeps and clicks from around her.  Without looking up Rey nods in response.  “You can stay if you want, I don’t mind.  Unless you’ve got other stuff to do but you’re all welcome whenever.”

There’s a small conference of lightning fast noise before a few of the droids beep and turn to leave while four of them seem content to cluster around the desk and talk.

Rey shakes her head, turns to the still mystified seeming Poe who’s standing in her door way.  She needs to clean up according to him so she reaches out and presses the button to shut the door in his face and turns towards the small bathroom she’s still in awe of that’s attached to her room.

Five minutes later and cleaner than she’s been in years Rey steps out into the hallway, surprised to see Poe still waiting on her.  He seems surprised to see her so quickly but he just smiles, waves a hand in her direction, and then turns to walk away.

Rey follows him silently to the mess.

The first thing that hits her is the scent of _food_.  Her stomach chooses that moment to remind her that she’s hungry and she grabs the tray Poe hands her tightly as she goes over her list in her mind.  She steps up to the cook, ready to start bartering, only to be taken aback when a heaping plate and a tall glass are practically shoved onto her tray before she’s shooed away.

There’s so much food on the tray, far too much surely.  Rey reasons that maybe she’s supposed to be carrying food for the others as well.

Her shock takes her all the way to the table where Chewbacca, General Organa, Poe, and a few others are all sitting.  There’s a place beside Chewbacca that’s obviously meant for her if the look the Wookie gives her is any indication so she takes it quietly.

She set the tray down on the table in front of her and waits for a moment but no one else makes a move towards the food in front of her.  In fact they all have similar plates in front of them in various stages of full and empty.

“Rey?”  The General’s voice breaks into her thoughts.  “Are you not going to eat?”

“Is this … am I allowed to?”  Rey’s quiet question seems to freeze most of the table in place and she feels more than hears the displeased rumble Chewbacca gives beside her.

“Of course you are!”  There’s a sort of outrage in Poe’s voice that takes Rey aback.

“It’s just … there’s a _lot_.”  Rey gestures towards her heaping plate.  “Enough for _days_ and I didn’t even have a chance to report or barter.”

“ _Barter_.”  It’s less of a question and more of a statement but Rey can tell the General wants an explanation.  The way the rest of the table is staring at her as well makes her vaguely uncomfortable.  It’s only the comforting brush of Chewbacca’s fur against her shoulder that keeps her in her seat.

“For portions?”  Rey spoke slowly, confused at their blank faces.  “I worked today, repaired some of the droids around camp and then started going through that scrap heap to see what could be mended.  I thought that’d be enough to earn food today, and if not I’d just do more tomorrow, but they didn’t even give me a chance to say anything.”  There was a building sense of displeasure at the table.  “Is that … not how things are done here?”

“No.”  General Organa’s hand was tight around her glass, shoulders stiff and mouth pursed.  “If you’re hungry you eat Rey.  There’s no need to _barter_.  You’re a part of the Resistance now and we take care of our own.  No one will go hungry under my command, not if I can help it.”

“Is that how things are done on Jakku?”  Poe asks her quietly.  “I knew it was a scavenger’s outpost for the most part but I didn’t realize it was so harsh.”

“You get used to it.”  Rey cautiously pulled her tray closer to herself, picked up her fork and took a small bite.  She had to bite back a moan at the taste and force herself to eat slowly.  She knew better than to go too fast.

“How long were you there?”  Poe seemed genuinely interested.

“I was six, I think, when my mother left me there.”  Rey shrugged.  “First couple of months were hard but I adjusted quickly.”

“ _Six_.”  General Organa mumbles and shakes her head.  “Were you left with family?”

“Don’t have any.”  Rey frowns lightly.  She doesn’t like to talk about it, about the promise she knew was never real, but she feels she owes the General answers.  She’d taken her in after all, has given her a place in the Resistance, the least Rey can do in return is give her the truth.  “My mother … didn’t want me anymore so she left me on Jakku.  She said she’d come back.”  Rey forces herself to take another bite, not hungry anymore but unwilling to not eat with food in front of her after so many years of gnawing hunger.  “We both knew it was a lie.  Never had a father.”

“I see.”  Across from her General Organa stiffens slightly before she seems to shake it off.

There’s a long pause of awkward silence at the table before Chewbacca huffs low in the back of his throat and reaches out to put a handful of thin brown, board like pieces of food on the side of Rey’s tray.  She stares at them surprised for a moment but picks one up at his insistent huff and takes a small bite.

“Oh.”  She knows she sounds as shocked as she feels.  “It’s sweet.”  She hasn’t had anything sweet in years, has only vague faded memories of the hard but brittle candies she’d eaten on her original home world when she was small.

Poe laughs, a bright and merry sound that cuts through the tension like a blade.

Rey stays quiet for the most part after that, just soaks up the atmosphere and eats slowly but steadily until she just can’t anymore.  Chewbacca is a warm, sturdy presence at her side even if he doesn’t really say much either.

But, when everyone parts ways, he trills at her softly, places one large hand on her head, and hands her something.  He’s gone before she can register what he’s done but when she opens the small sack she sees it’s more of the candy he’d given her.

She smiles softly as she cradles the bag to her chest and heads back to her room and the droids who are waiting for her.

She places it carefully inside the small chest at the end of her bed alongside the small handful of dried protein chips she’d hoarded from her plate and into her side bag when no one was looking.

~~~

“Again.”  Snoke’s voice rings out across the open training area.  Kylo moves back into his starting position and once again works his way through the forms that have been drilled into his mind and body through a mix of agony and repetition.

His saber is a line of bright wicked flame at his side, the cracked crystal at its core spits and hisses in a way that’s long grown familiar and almost comforting to his ears.

“Again.”

Kylo’s body flows without conscious thought, the forms long familiar to him, second nature now to both his body and his mind.

“Good.”  Snoke sounds as pleased as he ever does with Kylo’s mastery.  “Now for a more challenging exercise.”

The door on the opposite side of the arena opens and a small troop of attack droids stride into the room.

Kylo knows the day will be long and bloody both.

He’s used to it though and only grips his saber tighter.

A memory of the dream he’d had the night before assaults his mind then.  He’d traced his fingertips across the line of her cheeks, across the plush give of her mouth, the smattering of freckles that kissed the bridge of her nose.  He’d touched her softly, sweetly, _and she’d let him_.  She’d unfurled for him beneath such simple gentleness, had turned into the caresses like a flower to the sun.

He’d known then, in that moment, that when the time came he would belong to her just as surely as she would to him.

He’d woken with her name clinging to the tip of his tongue, her face haunting his mind, her scent a phantom that chased him throughout his day.

 _Rey_ something whispers in the back of his mind and somehow the sound is a perfect echo of his own heartbeat.  Somehow it matches the rhythm of his body, the rush of the blood in his veins and every swing of his saber all at the same time.

 _Rey, Rey, Rey_.  His mind chants her name but beneath that sound there’s another voice, one he recognizes and yet cannot place.  The word It speaks sounds an awful lot like _Balance_.

~~~

The Force _watched_.

It watched _everything_.

That was Its nature, Its way.

Its pieces were in place.  Balance was on the horizon.

All that was required was time.

And the Force was, above all else, _patient_.

It would have what It desired, would have Unity and Balance.  Already Its pieces moved as they should, entwined with each other even with the distance that separated them, pulled ever close by the ties that bound them together.

Soon they would join.

Soon Balance would be born.

**Author's Note:**

> Again this is my first time writing for the Star Wars fandom so tell me what you think guys.


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